A mistake by North Korean network providers opened up the country’s internet domain, revealing that the country has just 28 websites of the over a billion domains that exist worldwide.
The malfunction occurred on Monday evening due to a misconfiguration of the country’s nameserver (.kp), which allowed security engineer Matthew Bryant to access its domain and share its workings with the online world.
A recent documentary by BBC Panorama revealed that even the most privileged of North Koreans have little or no access to the internet and are only able to access an internal ‘Intranet,’ which provides them with state controlled information and propaganda.
The mistake could prove fatal for the person responsible, with the country known for its brutal treatment of its people for committing the most insignificant of crimes.
Bryant’s findings revealed that the country hosts websites such as Air Koryo, the country’s official airline, a social network called ‘Friend,’ as well as the Korean State News Agency, designed to reinforce state propaganda.
Some examples of headlines from the News Agency include, “Kim Jong Un Sends Birthday Spreads to Veteran Scholars,” as well as ““Narcotic-related Crimes Increase among S. Korean Youngsters.”
Talking to Motherboard, Bryant said that “we now have a complete list of domain names for the country and it’s surprisingly (or perhaps unsurprisingly) very small.”
A full list of the websites can be found here, with some of the sites still accessible to users outside the DPRK.
You can follow Ben Kew on Facebook, on Twitter at @ben_kew, or email him at ben@yiannopoulos.net
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.